


canvas

by EKmisao



Category: Les Misérables (2012)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Artists, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-23
Updated: 2013-06-23
Packaged: 2017-12-15 21:33:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 814
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/854281
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EKmisao/pseuds/EKmisao
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Art student Grantaire is filling a canvas, and Enjolras cannot help but interrupt.</p>
            </blockquote>





	canvas

**Author's Note:**

> I was frustrated about something, so this got typed down. Transferred here before tumblr buries it. Thank you for reading.

Enjolras watched him, staring blankly at a rough canvas, mounted on an easel. The landscape was familiar, somewhat, a favorite place from back home. However it looked bare, and pale, and lifeless, in his opinion. “Needs more tone, and shadow,” he told him. 

His voice startled the other artist. “H-hey.” He blushed, as much as a young man could blush under a head of dark messy curls. 

“What’s the landscape for?” Enjolras asked. 

“Supposed to be a gift,” the other said. He sighed at his canvas. “Eventually. I guess.” 

“The canvas is all pale, Grantaire,” Enjolras explained. “You should add shadow here, here, here, here,” he said, pointing in many places. 

Grantaire nodded, and sighed again. 

“Also, you need to add more contrast. You need to use your darker palettes.” Enjolras scratched his head. “To emphasize. To create more impact. Otherwise all you have is a pale painting.” He patted Grantaire’s shoulder. “You can do this.” 

“I wish.” That was all he said. 

……………………

When Enjolras saw the canvas again, the next day, the landscape did have more shadow and contrast. He found Grantaire brushing in more shade to the bushes, more color to the sun. However it all seemed….disjointed. 

Grantaire saw him coming this time. He lowered the brush. “Hey. Better?” 

Enjolras stared at the canvas, rubbing his chin. “You did add in the color. But you didn’t coordinate it with everything else.” 

Grantaire sighed again. “Okay.” He frowned. His shoulders sunk. 

“Even it out with everything else,” Enjolras added. 

Then he saw Grantaire drop the brush. 

“Are you alright?” 

“I guess,” came the reply, with a shrug and a drop of the arms. 

…………….

The next day Enjolras found an unfinished canvas, but no painter. The canvas showed a landscape with uneven, uncoordinated shades and tones. It had a quirky pleasing overall effect, though. “Anyone know where Grantaire went?” he asked nobody in particular. 

“Out cold, in the dorm,” someone yelled out from behind another easel. “Drunk his head off last night.” 

“Saying something about someone saying so much!” another chimed in. 

Enjolras stared at the canvas. It reminded him of his favorite scene, back home, a park by a beach, a strange but pleasing juxtaposition of forest and sea, sand and green. It also reminded him of the painter, a strange but pleasing combination of light and dark, depression and mad expression. 

Yet it also reminded him of himself, the way he himself liked to paint, how he preferred to present landscapes. It looked more like a painting that he made, rather than the painter’s. It no longer looked much like Grantaire’s painting, but his own. 

“I just wanted to help,” he spoke to himself. 

………………….

There was a new canvas when he saw the easel again. Rather, it was a sketchpad that he saw, mounted on the easel, with Grantaire rapidly sketching something with charcoal, intent and focused. He gave him a quick glance and resumed sketching, as if he did not see him. 

Enjolras watched from a distance as the curls bobbed in front of the sketchpad, a charcoal piece speedily coursing through the paper. The lips were pursed together, the eyebrows furrowed close to each other, the arm muscles tight, the eyes focused. 

Suddenly the charcoal piece was dropped, the sketchpad was lifted off and immediately flipped shut, the artist pushed back the stool, stood, walked out of the studio. Without looking back. 

Enjolras looked around, seeking an explanation. Everyone else shrugged. 

………………………..

He did not see him again after that. He was surrounded by other students, immersed in meetings and quick party appearances. Part of his job, wearing several hats as class president, org president, batch rep. Grantaire was none of these, an ordinary student of the art college, frequently the class clown or the party drunk but otherwise not memorable. For some reason he just kept an eye on him. 

“Anyone see him?” he asked everywhere. Yet no one could give him an answer. 

Tired from the day, he finally trudged back to his dorm room, the long night well spent. 

Leaning on the door was a large wrapped package, a canvas hidden within brown paper, held together with packaging tape. There was no address or name given on the wrapping, so he tore it open. 

He stared. His hands dropped the wrapping paper. 

It was the canvas. His favorite park by the beach, on a windy summer day, with children playing and ladies lounging, the sea bright blue contrasting with the deepness of the forest green. Uneven, pale, beautiful, memorable. 

And as he opened the door, he found a large piece of torn sketchpad paper on the floor, as if pushed in through the crack. 

“Happy birthday” was written in the corner with careful script, to a sketch of himself smiling and enjoying a summer breeze of a lazy college holiday. 

Grantaire was the only one who remembered.


End file.
